Hamlet as told on Baker Street
by Arty Diane
Summary: Case inspired by ACD's story "The Adventure of the Devil's Foot". Sherlock and John are on the case.John distracts Lestrade from stolen evidence by a parody of Hamlet, but Lestrade becomes obsessed with the story and tries to involve the duo. 2 shot.
1. Chapter 1

**Thanks to dear Ennui Enigma for editing this story, without her help and encouragement this story would not be published!**

**The case is inspired by Arthur Conan Doyle's story "The Adventure of the Devil's Foot". The modern version of Hamlet is ****_Hamlet: As Told on the Street_**** by Shel Silverstein. **

**The story takes place sometime after Sherlock is back from his hiatus and all the characters are reconciled with each other (well, as reconciled as they'll ever get that is!)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own ACD's story or characters, neither the TV series characters nor Shakespeare's Hamlet nor Silverstein's Hamlet.**

**This is my first story, please read and review. Reviews are highly appreciated!**

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**Hamlet as told on Baker Street**

John and Sherlock walked into their flat. John slumped in his armchair utterly exhausted while Sherlock started pacing in front of him. John envied Sherlock's seemingly never-ending energybecause after running around half of London interviewing witnesses and chasing after a suspectwith unsatisfactory results, John was thoroughly worn out. How Sherlock managed to keep standing, let alone pace with such velocity, eluded John.

The case that they were working on was a series of robberies. The interesting fact was that the thief had gone through the victims' possessions with the utmost care and had taken his time while the homeowners were asleep in their houses. The locks were picked but there were never signs of a struggle. The thief was careful to avoid waking the intended victims. He always put the owners to sleep before he entered. Laboratory analysis of the victims' last ingestion of food and drink revealed no drugs or poison. All reported a feeling of heaviness and stuffy air after waking up so it was assumed that the sedative was administered through air. Unfortunately all evidence of such was destroyed because each victim had invariably opened up their window upon awaking.

But, like all criminals, this thief made a mistake. Well, a miscalculation really, and it was John who first noticed it.

There was a shaded lamp in the sitting room of victim number 5. While they interviewed the witness, John sat on the chair near the side table and took notes. He found the room's light insufficient, so he turned on the shaded lamp on the table and continued his task. Then the fumes hit his nostrils. He immediately began to feel dizzy.

"John, what's wrong?" Sherlock looked at John with a mixture of confusion and concern.

The room began to swim in front of John's eyes and he noticed something else "What's that weird smell?"

The witness piped up "that's exactly the smell I sensed last night, right before I fell asleep!"

That is how Sherlock figured the drug was placed in the inner covering of the shade. When the owner turned the lamp on, the heat produced by the light bulb made the drug evaporate, thus subduing the home-owner. You see, all the other home owners had regular light bulbs which made a lot more heat than the energy efficient bulb the last owner used. This light bulb produced much less heat which resulted in the partial evaporation of the drug. Therefore when Sherlock and John were investigating the crime scene, some of the drug was left and Sherlock was able to take some of it in order to further investigate the matter.

Sherlock pulled out a small bag full of yellow powder out of his pocket while still pacing in front of the fire place.

"Isn't that considered tampering with the evidence?" asked John, remembering watching Sherlock scrape off some of the yellow powder into the evidence bag in the last victim's flat.

"Hardly, I only took a portion of the powder and left the other half for the police to investigate. Any amount of the drug is enough to reach the desired conclusion. I even pointed out the lamp to the head of the forensics team. Whether he makes use of it or not is his choice"

"By head of forensics team you mean Anderson?"

Sherlock paused in his pacing and made a face "Yes."

John snorted "Anderson who is as bright as a dynamo light on a bicycle traveling at two miles per hour? Forget withholding evidence, that's obstruction of justice!"

They were in the middle of a fit of giggles when they heard someone at the door.

"It's Lestrade, probably here to see if we've made any progress with the case" Sherlock informed John while he hastily put the little bag under the skull. He then turned towards the door as the DI came in "Ah, Lestrade, perfect timing as usual."

"How did you know it was me?"

"The fifth and twelfth stares are squeaky, you always step on the fifth one, then you remember about the creaky steps and when you reach the twelfth step you hesitate because you can't remember if it was the twelfth or the thirteenth, then you decide it's not important and you step on it on your way up."

"Awe, you've memorized my climbing pattern, how sweet!"

Sherlock was taken aback, but he quickly recovered. Ignoring John's attempt at hiding his smile, Sherlock pushed on "I think you've come here to hear about our progress in the case. Best have your pen and paper ready, I will not repeat myself!"

So they started filling him in on their findings right up to their conclusion about the airborne nature of the drug.

There was a pause and out of the blue Lestrade spotted the skull. He moved towards it "I don't believe it! You still have this poor old guy? Why don't you bury him and let him have some peace?" He made to pick it up when John and Sherlock shouted "NO!" Lestrade froze, but before he could get suspicious, John said "Yorik is essential to the recitals."

Lestrade's eyebrows raised suspiciously, "what recitals?"

"_Hamlet: As Told on the Street_ by Shel Silverstein"

"Why not Hamlet as told by Shakespeare?"

"Because when Sherlock is playing his violin at three in the morning, I can't exactly concentrate on the sixteenth century version. My two favorite parts are the scene in the graveyard and Hamlet and Ophelia's argument. Silverstein took the original speech and put in two different parts of the book, but they can be read together."

Lestrade seemed intrigued "How does it go?"

John started reciting the poem. Sherlock was shocked by the modern adaptation. Lestrade was very much amused. In fact he liked it so much that he said "OK, I'd like to see the graveyard scene while you hold the skull."

"There is no holding the skull, it is only addressed."

"Yes there is, all Hamlets hold the skull!"

"Mel Gibson doesn't hold it."

"Yes he does!"

"No he doesn't! We'll have a movie night, Mel Gibson's Hamlet. If He holds the skull…"

"Oh, I see a wager is in order!"

Sherlock suddenly asked, "What is the wager going to be?"

John and Lestrade paused. Then Lestrade turned to John. "How about you bake me cake?"

John snorted "Sure, if you want some grilled feet on the side as well!"

Lestade's face turned a faint tint of green "Er, no thanks! Now that I think of it, I don't have a stove at my flat to bake if I lose."

"John could treat you to a drink in the pub?" Sherlock suggested.

"Boring!" came the simultaneous reply of the DI and the doctor.

John was becoming frustrated "I'll rehearse all of Hamlet as told on the street for you? I don't know, how about we decide on it tomorrow."

"Deal! See you two on Saturday then!"

They both collapsed on the sofa in relief when Lestrade left.

"I guess I should go work on the contents and formula of the drug then." Sherlock said. Then he noticed a mischievous look spreading on John's face and felt a bit alarmed. "What are you planning?"

"I can use it to make you sleep when you get insomnia and decide to screech on your violin in the middle of the night!" John said with a wicked smile.

"John!"

"What? It's had successful testing and we know it just puts people to sleep, it's not like it induces everlasting madness or anything."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because I'm pretty sure we both took that one a while ago!"


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks to all of you who have read this story and reviewed. Here is the secound and final part of the story. I hope you like it!**

**Thanks again to dear Ennui Enigma for helping me clear the vague parts and making the story flow better in this chapter as well!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own ACD's story or characters, neither the TV series characters nor Shakespeare's Hamlet nor Silverstein's Hamlet.**

**Please read and review. Reviews are highly appreciated!**

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The day after the skull incident Sherlock discovered the exact compound of the drug. Given thecomplexity and rarity of the compound, Sherlock had concluded that the thief was most likely a student of either chemistry or pharmaceutics.

Since the drug was first found in a shade lamp, they interviewed the victims again and found out that all of the shaded lamps were bought from the same department store. A cross reference of the employee records' at the factory warehouse revealed the name of their prime suspect, Peter Sterndale, a chemistry student with a morbid financial record.

Sherlock rose from behind his computer and made a bee line for his coat. "John! I found who did it, let's go!"

John got up from his chair and went to pick up his coat as well "did you tell Lestrade?"

"Mmh? No, why?"

"We can't arrest the guy ourselves, we need the police for that!"

"Fine then, tell him on the way."

"What? No! You're the police consultant, you should tell him."

"No, you tell him!"

"You tell him!"

"You tell him!"

"Seriously? Sherlock, you're the one who knows the damn address!"

"Oh, alright then…"

After informing Lestrade about their breakthrough and (finally) sending him the address, John and Sherlock went to the department store to question Peter. At the sight of the two, the young man freaked out and started to run.

"Why is he running? We hadn't even said anything yet!" John said irritated.

"Well, we can stand here and speculate about the reason of what scared him off, or we can go after him and ask him." Sherlock said casually.

"I'll go from the right, then." and with that John was off.

After ten minutes Sherlock and Peter were face to face in the middle of an aisle with ornamental wooden boxes stacked high in rows on both sides of them. Peter quickly picked a box and held in his hand in a gesture that was a cross between defense and attack.

"That is neither an effective weapon nor is your stance a very impressive one. I suggest you-"

Sherlock was cut off by a sharp and painful blow to his shoulder. Apparently Peter had made up his mind while Sherlock was delivering his speech and chose the attack position. But as he reached for a second box, he felt pain shooting up his arm from the point where Sherlock's box had hit him.

"A blow for a Blow! So, are you two going to keep throwing boxes at each other all night?" John's voice came from Peter's right.

"John, are you going to help or are you going to keep narrating the events of our little scuffle like a wild life documentary voice over?"

"I was going for the chorus effect, or the novel narrator, but since it is quite a _wild_ fight you're having, I think your description is fitting as well!" John said grinning. He took another step towards Peter, cleared his throat, raised his hand to show the glass orb in it and said "I have a fully loaded snow globe here and I am not afraid to use it!"

Sherlock's eyebrows lifted "Why John, I thought you weren't the mess making type!"

"I was thinking about the end result with all that glitter on him. He'll look like a proper Sandman!"

Then John turned to Peter and said "Two to one, mate. You're outnumbered. Best give up quietly and save yourself the bruises." Peter hesitated for a moment, but then he put down the box.

Just then Lestrade appeared on Sherlock's left. "We found his lab in the back of the storage space."

"That is quite an operation you have running back there lad, you could have ended up blowing yourself up." Lestrade admonished the boy while cuffing him.

John come up to Sherlock "Where were you hit?"

"It's nothing, John. It was just a stray box not a poisoned sword wound in a medieval duel or anything of that caliber!"

Peter winced as Sherlock mentioned the words _poisoned sword_.

"Thank God for that, but still, we'd better get some ice on it when we get back home, just to keep the swelling down."

They moved to the back of the storage space to inspect Peter's lab. What they saw impressed them. "It's a wonder how he managed to accomplish such accuracy in his formula with these primitive instruments." Sherlock marveled "This is more fitted for producing street dugs rather than a delicate airborne sedative."

"Come to think of it, it would have been a lot easier to make money by simply manufacturing the drug rather than the whole sci-fi operation and burglary." John interjected. "Why do you think that is?"

"He had a family member, most probably a sister, who was addicted to these drugs and died because she used a concoction that was a hack job. Therefor he preferred to go robbing people's homes rather than to inflict the same misery his sister went through in order to assuage his financial woes"

Sherlock caught the look of confusion on John and Lestrade's faces. "He flinched when I said _poisoned sword_. He had a course on Shakespeare this semester," he paused for effect.

"Oh, Laertes and Hamlet's duel after Ophelia's death" Lestrade concluded.

"Precisely, so sister it is."

"And so Peter Sterndale's ninja days ended in his arrest and his tragic story is brilliantly deduced from a duel of flying boxes." John mused.

"You've slipped into that narrator mode again." Sherlock said dryly.

"You know," Lestrade pitched in, "John does narrate your story all the time on his blog. Just like Horatio did for Hamlet, after all, that is how Hamlet's story is known, by Horatio's narration."

"When did you become a Hamlet expert?" Sherlock asked with a hint of amusement in his voice.

"Well, after John's recital I got interested in the original, so I ended up reading a simplified version of it and checking some study guides on the net. You know, that exchange of blows was eerily similar to the last scene of the play."

"Fortunately, it's minus the litter of bodies on the floor." John muttered irritably.

"I understand your new found obsession with Hamlet, Lestrade, but I think for your analogy to be plausible, even for a parody, you are missing quite a few characters." Sherlock mused loudly.

"Oh, no!" John burst out, "We are not going to start comparing everyone we know to characters from that blasted play!"

"Too late, the comparisons are already forming. Wait, I just found an inspirational idea for the Yard's Christmas fund raiser. We can put on an abridged version of Hamlet and all of you will be in it! Anderson and Donovan can be Rosencrantz and Guildenstern"

"Mycroft will be perfect for Polonius since he's always spying on me."

Lestrade caught the disapproving look on John's face "What is your objection to this anyway?"

"First, it's a freakin' tragedy, with almost every character dying at the end," John said acidly, "and second, I'dreally like to see who your corresponding character would be, Gertrude or Ophelia?"

"Okay, first of all, the Claudius of our story is dead; he shot himself in the head. And for your second question, I am the leader of the players, since I provide the entertainment."

A scene of Hamlet flashed in John's mind. The scene of Hamlet sitting on the ground and clutching Ophelia's leg while watching the incriminating play being acted out in front of the King. John relaxed a little, he then faced Sherlock and said "You know, I'd really like to see how you'd manage that play within a play part, especially the interaction with Ophelia."

"O, Molly will be a perfect Ophelia!" Lestrade said enthusiastically.

"Yes, she'll be brilliant." John said with mock eagerness, "And think of all the quality time you'll spend with Mycroft and Sally and Anderson, Sherlock, it'll be great!"

Sherlock looked horrified "I'd rather mend the bullet holes on the wall!"

John took pity on Lestrade's crushed dreams and decided to help him make a compromise "Okay, let's upgrade your idea. How about you dramatize _Hamlet: As Told on the Street_. I'll give you my copy. The characters are kind of different in this version so you can find new people to fit them. It's also shorter and the language is modern, so it'll have a better chance of success. What do you think?"

Lestrade dove into this modified plan "Ya, that'll work! So let me see, maybe I can get Dimok to play Horatio, who will be Hamlet? Maybe…"

Sherlock and John left Lestrade to his plannings and escaped before he could change his mind about enlisting them in the play.

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Two weeks after the skull incident Sherlock went to Lestrade's office to help him solve some cold cases. Just before he got to Lestrade's office, Sally Donovon greeted him with "Hey there, you gloomy Gus, are you here to party with us?"

Before Sherlock could react, Lestrade came to greet him with "How's it going Ham? How's Horatio?"

Sherlock barely had time to narrow his eyes when Anderson said "Horatio? Don't tell me you're hooked on CSI: Miami!" The two of them slapped their foreheads and turned to look at him with looks that screamed IDIOT!

Sherlock was the first to reply "Clearly you did not pass your grade school English otherwise you would have recognized the reference to Shakespeare's Hamlet!"

Anderson stared at them for a few seconds and shrugged. "We studied Taming of the Shrew that year!"

"As told on the street I presume?!"

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**Just a few points:**

**Sandman is a mythical character that is believed to bring good dreams.**

**In Shakespeare's Hamlet, Claudius is the main villain that is responsible for Hamlet's father and everyone else's death in one way or another.**

**Horatio is Hamlet's best friend. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Hamlet's supposed friends, but they spy on him and inadvertently try to kill him.**

**Gertrude is Hamlet's mother. Ophelia is Hamlet's love interest.**

**Polonius is the king's main spy and he orchestrates all the spying operations that go around Hamlet. He is the father of Ophelia and Laertes. Hamlet is killed by a poison sword in a duel with Laertes because of Ophelia's death **


End file.
